


Queer

by therecognitionscene



Category: Long Exposure (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, Use of Homophobic Slur, but just once, woops that was a sad update huh folks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-17
Updated: 2017-03-17
Packaged: 2018-10-06 19:34:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10343121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therecognitionscene/pseuds/therecognitionscene
Summary: Jonas isn't queer.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Long Exposure belongs solely to smokeplanet.

_ Queer _ .

The click of the bedroom door echoes through his mind as it closes behind Mitch, jarring and almost deafeningly loud, as if it had been slammed again. Jonas stares at it without really seeing it, but he can’t tell if that’s because of the tears burning in his eyes or because his mind feels like it’s stalled.

_ Fag _ .

His bed's still warm, the sheets and blankets retaining the combined heat of their bodies. Mitch had been so warm. When he runs his hands over it his palms tingle and something deep inside of him aches. The green light--his beacon of fear and shock--ribbons around him, blinking like a distress signal, like his body is sending out a morse code plea for help.

_ Gay _ .

He can still smell Mitch’s body wash, a sort of cheap soapy scent that he’s grown increasingly fond of. It lingers in his nostrils and dominates his senses with every shallow breath he manages to suck in. Did that really all happen? Mitch, on top of him? Looking at him so tenderly, and had they really been about to kiss? To press their lips together and melt into one another and--

Oh, God.

It all comes rushing in and crashes over him like a wave, like a tsunami, dragging him down into inky black depths. He’s shaking--has he been shaking this whole time?--and he knows he needs to go find Dean, needs to go do damage control. Explain to his foster parent that no, it’s not what it had looked like, they aren’t  _ gay _ , Jonas isn’t--couldn’t be-- He likes  _ Carmen _ , for God’s sake, he glows pink and warm when he thinks of her.

_ Pink for Mitch, too _ , a traitorous voice whispers in his mind, and he drops his head into his hands and pulls at his soft curls, his eyes stuck wide open. He doesn’t cry; the tears don’t seem to want to drip down his cheeks, the sobs won’t rise in his throat. He wishes they would. Crying would make him feel better. But his panic is all-consuming and it freezes him up from the inside out. He feels brittle, hollow, stuck on the edge of a cliff, staring down a dizzying height that’s sure to kill him if he just takes that final step off…

He’s not gay. Not gay. Not gay, and especially not for Mitch Mueller. Gay is other people, strangers, not anyone he knows; gay is scary, and foreign, and difficult. Gay is coming out and being brave, hoping for acceptance and fearing rejection.

And Mitch? Mitch is a bully. Mitch likes to hurt people and prey on their insecurities and weaknesses. He’s been the antagonist of Jonas’ life for so long that the younger boy can’t imagine him as anything else. He can dream, sure, and hope, but the fact of the matter is that Mitch doesn’t actually care about him, or even  _ like _ him. He can’t. Because if he did, then that means he thinks Jonas is special, and he’s not  _ special _ . 

He’s just  _ Jonas _ . 

Mitch is gone. How long has he been gone for? Jonas isn’t sure. Minutes could have passed, or hours. No one’s come looking for him yet, not Dean or Sue or Sidney. His phone has remained distressingly still and silent; not even Mitch has reached out to him. He lives in a house chock full of people, a child who’d been left in the care of the foster system, but he feels more alone now than ever before.

Dean is waiting for him, he’s sure of it. Waiting for Jonas to crawl downstairs and deny everything, spew the same twisting train of ill-formed logic that’s running through his own head on repeat. Not gay. Just friends. Not Mitch. Never Mitch. And he, Jonas Wagner, will do just that. 

Because he’s a coward.

Because he can’t be

_ Queer _ .


End file.
